September 08, 2008

mtDNA of Mongolians

While I agree that the Mongol Empire played a major role in the admixture of Caucasoids and Mongoloids, we have very clear evidence now that the two races had been mixing in Central Asia long before that time.

J Hum Genet.

Genetic imprint of the Mongol: signal from phylogeographic analysis of mitochondrial DNA

Cheng B, Tang W, He L, Dong Y, Lu J, Lei Y, Yu H, Zhang J, Xiao C.

Abstract

Mitochondrial deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) from 201 unrelated Mongolian individuals in the three different regions was analyzed. The Mongolians took the dominant East Asian-specific haplogroups, and some European-prevalent haplogroups were detected. The East Asians-specific haplogroups distributed from east to west in decreasing frequencies, and the European-specific haplogroups distributed conversely. These genetic data suggest that the Mongolian empire played an important role in the maternal genetic admixture across Mongolians and even Central Asian populations, whereas the Silk Road might have contributed little in the admixture between the East Asians and the Europeans.

9 comments:

While I agree that the Mongol Empire played a major role in the admixture of Caucasoids and Mongoloids, we have very clear evidence now that the two races had been mixing in Central Asia long before that time.

Sure, the Mongol Empire after all was only the penultimate epysode of Turkic expansion, that had been going on for more than one thousand years then. Probably Turkic expansion in earlier times was as decissive if not more in the genetic shaping of Central Asia as the brief Mongol epysode that was anyhow mostly manned by Turkic peoples.

Well in hindsight, I suppose Europe ends at the Ural mountains in Russia. Although the end of Europe was considered Moscow once, and Turkey is sometimes considered European other times not.

Anyway its a small matter but I think they should use Caucasoid or at least be more specific and narrow it down some and give some ideas. As Europeans can be told apart from West/Central Asians or whatever you want to call them.

"While I agree that the Mongol Empire played a major role in the admixture of Caucasoids and Mongoloids, we have very clear evidence now that the two races had been mixing in Central Asia long before that time."

Now, here's a dilemma: are "Caucasoid" and "Mongoloid" genetic categories that are defined by belonging to particular haplogroups, or are they physical anthropological categories defined by a person's morphological attributes?

The reason I bring this up is because Mongols are anything but "Caucasoid" or "part-Caucasoid" in terms of their phenotypes. They are rather some of the most extreme "Mongoloids" on the face of the planet.

Since ~50,000 years ago, when the first AMHs migrated out of Pakistan and Afghanistan into Europe (and pooled there to eventually migrate farther NE), there has never been a clear distinction between these two human groups.

The most extreme Mongolians are simply the groups that were isolated for the longest time from the originally much larger pre-caucasian population spanning much of the Indian and European continent.

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